


Where Eagles Dare

by scarsandstars



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Established Relationship, Fluff, Ghosts, Light Horror, M/M, Polyamory, Spooky, Urban Exploration, abandoned buildings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-12
Updated: 2019-02-12
Packaged: 2019-10-27 00:50:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,910
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17756651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarsandstars/pseuds/scarsandstars
Summary: Keith decides he wants to explore an abandoned building with Hunk and Shiro. But Hunk, having some common sense to him, decides he's not going to join them; instead, he will stand by in case something goes wrong. The place is ugly, creepy, smelly, but it doesn't exactly look unsafe. So nothing bad is going to happen.Right?





	Where Eagles Dare

**Author's Note:**

> so when work is slow i waste a lot of my time watching creepy videos on youtube so of course it was only a matter of time before i decided to write something half spooky half silly, like my personality, with my favorite boys who are boyfriends. why? just because.

A thing both Shiro and Hunk have in common at this very moment is regret. Sheer, unadulterated regret. They regret being too tired to go out last week like they had planned. Hunk regrets suggesting they stay home, Shiro regrets opening a bottle of tequila; Hunk regrets pulling up YouTube on their screen, and Shiro regrets being too drunk and snuggly to stop this before it started. It's pretty much all they can feel at this very moment, while Keith stands in front of them with an almost ecstatic smile on his face and a video camera in his hand.

"Where did you even get that?" Hunk asks.

"Lance."

"Ugh, man, I don't even wanna know what Lance is doing with that thing," Hunk says without thinking.

"Oh, come on," Shiro moans like someone had fatally wounded him and presses his fingers to his closed eyelids. Keith understands instantly. 

"Look. I know you don't wanna come, Hunk, so you can just stay here and wait while I go with Shiro," Keith explains, practically buzzing in his own skin with excitement.

"What?" Shiro cries.

"You're coming with me," Keith states, setting the camera down on the dining room table and moving stuff around inside the fancy leather bag it came with.

Shiro looks at Hunk almost pleadingly in silence, with that kicked-puppy look he gets on his face without noticing. It's the same look that makes Hunk weak in the knees and makes him think that he would not hesitate to dive into a pool full of flesh-eating alligators if Shiro asked him. It's adorable, yeah, but it's too powerful and therefore too dangerous. 

"Keith, buddy," Hunk starts, "why don't we just go somewhere? Huh? How about a movie?"

Now it's Keith's turn to give him the neglected-kitten eyes. 

"We could... go bowling?"

"Hunk."

"What if we do something more... _fun_ with the camera?" Hunk smirks, already on the verge of desperation.

But even the promise of fun sexy times isn't enough to dissuade Keith from this idea that wormed its way into his big, thick, obnoxiously stubborn yet beautiful head: he really wants to document his exploring of an abandoned building. And not just any abandoned building. Keith goes on to explain to them that he's been looking around all week for the right place with the right vibe and found an abandoned hotel just outside of town. He explains that it's only ten minutes out of town next to a gas station. 

"There's an awesome food truck really close, we can totally go there when we're done," Keith grins and his eyes shine like that was enough to convince Hunk to risk his life by breaking into a creepy abandoned hotel.

"I mean... It kinda sounds exciting when you put it that way," Shiro shrugs in an utter betrayal of Hunk's trust. When he sees the way Hunk looks at him, as if he'd just murdered his beloved pet in ritual sacrifice, Shiro raises his hand defensively. "What? It can be kind of a date, right? Like an unusual date, you know? Something exciting?"

"So instead of dinner and a movie you want demonic possession and cheap tacos? Is that what you want?" Hunk asks.

"Hunk, come on," Keith smiles at his pout and strokes his crossed arms. "Nothing bad is gonna happen. And you don't have to come."

Hunk looks at Keith and his tiny smile and he can feel his frown soften, and then he looks at Shiro and _his_ own tiny, charming smile and he groans in frustration. "I can't just let you guys go alone, it'll drive me crazy not knowing if the ceiling collapsed on you or the floorboards broke and you both fell to your deaths, or if you were murdered by some crazy satanists or whatever thing you find in there."

Shiro laughs while Keith's eyes grow about three times their normal size, and he opens his mouth to speak but Hunk shushes him and presses an authoritative finger to his lips. "No no no, don't get it wrong, I'm not going in with you guys because I actually enjoy my life. But I'm driving your dumb asses there and waiting in the car, alright? And those cheap tacos better be fucking amazing, Keith. I swear to god if they put something stupid in their salsa I'm holding this against you forever."

Keith is practically beaming.

*****

Shiro returned to this town nine months ago, and since then, so many things have happened that he never would have imagined. At the top of the list of course was the fact that he got back in touch with Keith and somehow ended up dating him, and Hunk. Not that he's upset about that. What self-respecting gay man would complain about having not one, but two, gorgeous, funny, smart, caring boyfriends? 

He's starting to reconsider some things, though. 

Hunk is driving them like he promised. It's almost eleven and there's still plenty of cars out on the streets; because it's Friday night, they're driving past many open restaurants and bars and stores and then, eventually, the cars around them start to disappear and the noise starts to quiet down. From the backseat where he is, he can see Hunk drumming his fingers on the wheel to the tune of the song playing on the radio, only with about seven times more anxiety than anybody would drum their fingers to a Queen song. Next to him, Keith holds the camera on his lap and turns it in his hands like he hasn't quite figured out how to work it. And Shiro would be lying if he didn't say Hunk's idea of using the camera for other, more fun, perhaps more physical but infinitely less dangerous activities didn't tempt him; he'd be lying if, looking at Hunk's anxious hands or the way Keith excitedly bounces his thigh on the seat, he said he wouldn't really rather be back home making out with either of them on the couch while the other orders takeout.

But Keith is so excited it's pretty hard not to feel both tenderness and some excitement as well. A smidge of it, at least. 

"It's down there," Keith says, pointing down the road. 

"Okay."

"Maybe we can park down there," Keith points at a street corner underneath a bridge.

"Alright."

Hunk dutifully parks the car, and there's a strange tension in the air, coming mostly from him, that Shiro actually feels could be cut with a knife. And while he's on the subject of knives, he has the passing thought that he sure wishes Keith brought that one fancy blade he usually keeps in his boot along with the camera and flashlights, just in case.

"Guys," Hunk tries to sound casual and unbothered but doesn't succeed at all, "we can just go find the food truck. It's not too late, right?"

"We'll be fine, babe, don't worry about it," Keith replies and gives Hunk a good old kiss before stepping out of the car.

Then, Hunk turns to Shiro with big, beautiful, terrified eyes but says nothing.

"I guess we'll be fine," Shiro shrugs, and gives Hunk another kiss, along with a little pat on the cheek. When Hunk grabs his wrist and frowns, Shiro gives him another quick peck. "We'll be back real soon, okay?"

"Dude," Hunk's voice is a little shaky. "Just be careful okay? Call if you need me or whatever, okay?"

Shiro smiles. 

Outside the car, Keith is already bouncing a little bit when Shiro comes out, and he wastes no time grabbing Shiro's wrist and pulling him along. The camera is on by the time Shiro notices, and Keith is looking into it--excited as he is, he's not smiling when he talks into the camera. Shiro didn't actually ask if Keith has any intention of posting this little adventure anywhere.

Keith doesn't say something cheesy like the people they watched, which Shiro guesses is only natural. "We're about to go into this abandoned hotel," is what he hears Keith say before the camera is shoved in his face. "This is Shiro. He's the hot piece of ass keeping me safe tonight."

"Keith..."

"Come on, let's go in," Keith says, smirking, and starts to walk along the brick wall.

Around the corner, after Shiro looks back and can't see the car anymore, Keith finds a hole between the wall and some kind of beat-up garden fence, and crawls right through it like a very large cat while Shiro holds the camera, waiting for his turn. He's not as graceful as Keith when he attempts to slide in, what with being quite a few inches taller, more than just a few pounds heavier, and not having an arm, but he manages even while Keith's obnoxious camera records every one of his moves and Keith himself tries not to giggle too loudly.

The grass is overgrown and patches of it are dry, patches of it are entirely gone, there's weeds growing out of every corner in the yard and so much garbage Shiro doesn't even know where it's safe to step. Cans, bottles, plastic bags, broken bricks, things that make gross, wet, crackling sounds as Keith walks across the yard towards the building. 

"I don't actually know anything about this place, just that it was a hotel. Not a very luxurious one," Keith explains to the camera and then turns it around to film the large building: the many broken windows on its three storeys, the worn-out paint, the broken bricks, the cracks on the walls. "So I guess we'll see what happens. Right, Kashi?" he smiles and looks back at Shiro, who just shrugs.

'Guess we'll die,' is all Shiro thinks before continuing to follow Keith. 

He reckons he's had a good life, for the most part. He's fulfilled many dreams. He's learnt many things. He's bought many useless things he now wishes he had put to better use, like that one expensive rice cooker he bought that one time when he was drunk with power and also with rum after his first ever Christmas bonus in his first ever apartment, even though he had a perfectly fine one already. He's been a good son. He's been a good friend. He's fallen in love. He's had a lot of sex. 

A lot, a lot of sex, his mind wanders, because he's focusing his attention on Keith's ass instead of the graffitied walls and the broken, dusty windows. He focuses his attention on Keith struggling to crack open an unlocked yet very stuck door that looks like it's rotten somehow, splintered on the edges and covered with a big, crude, spray-painted penis in red. 

"This looks promising," Shiro says, and right after, Keith puts the camera in his hand to use both hands to open the door. "Okay. So. Babe. Keith. _Keith_ ," Shiro speaks while Keith pulls at the door, his fingers pale against the door. Shiro zooms the camera in on Keith's ass at the lack of a response, only mere grunts. "What are we trying to accomplish here."

"You're only asking me that _now,_ Kashi?" 

Fair question. 

"I just wanna see what's in there." Keith grunts and the door finally cracks fully open. He takes the camera from Shiro, giving him one of those shit-eating grins that can either infuriate or turn Shiro on, and of course, given the circumstances, his reaction is much closer to the former. 

"What do you think is in there? Mothman?"

"Oh that's hilarious," Keith says, holding the door open for Shiro. "We're not even in Virginia." He turns around and turns on his flashlight. “Why would we look for Mothman outside of Virginia?”

"Like I'm supposed to know that," Shiro mumbles.

The place is horrid. They're in the middle of what he guesses was once the lobby, a large room with pitiful remnants of furniture scattered around: the flashlight illuminates two bright red seats, the fabric dusty and ripped open in several places; then a large wooden table turned upside down and missing two legs, splintered and lying over a bed of dead leaves and stagnant water puddles. 

"Fuck," Shiro sighs almost unconsciously as the light shines a circle over the wall on the right side: there's three large windows, all of them broken and covered up crudely with planks of dark wood, sharp remains of glass sticking out of them like knives covered in years' worth of dust, dull and opaque. Of course, there's graffiti on these walls as well. Shiro mostly sees random black lines, dumb, edgy pentagrams and 666's, along with a few juvenile phrases--'Jordan likes to suck cock' one of them reads, and while Shiro thinks, for a second, "You and me both, Jordan," he's pulled out of his mind by a gasp coming from Keith. It immediately makes his heart race and he grabs Keith's arm. "What?"

"Check this out," Keith can barely contain his excitement when he points both the flashlight and the camera to a spot on the floor a couple of steps away.

Of course there's another god damn pentagram spray-painted on the filthy floorboards. Only instead of it lying on gross puddles of water like that poor table behind them, there's a dark, seemingly viscous liquid staining the wood around it. 

"What the fuck is that?"

But Keith is already kneeling down to examine it more closely. Keith's gonna do what Keith's gonna do, that much is true, but Shiro still makes an attempt. 

"Maybe you shouldn't touch that."

"It's fine."

Shiro swallows hard while Keith grabs a branch and pokes at one of the stains, pointing the flashlight and camera at it. So, against his better instincts, Shiro takes a look around. It's of course too dark to make out any distinct shapes. He can see two columns in the middle of the room and he's sure the dark, long shadow on the opposite corner of the door was once the reception counter of this hotel.

There's dead leaves piled up all across the floor along with other things Shiro isn't sure he wants to know about. He believes that they are all damp, though, which is why, when he hears the distinct sound of dry leaves crunching under someone's (or some _thing's_ ) weight, he gasps and grabs Keith's arm again just as he stands, startling him. 

"What the hell?"

"Didn't you hear that?" Shiro would like for his voice to not be shaking and slightly panicked after they've been inside the hotel for less than ten minutes, but he can't help it. 

"It's probably a rat or something, don't worry about it." 

"Right. Okay." Shiro calms his voice down, but not his anxious fingers practically clawing into Keith's arm. 

"Let's keep going," Keith shines the camera and flashlight right in Shiro's face and chuckles at his scrunched up nose. Then, still visibly excited, he starts to walk further into the former lobby. 

Shiro follows. But not before taking one last look behind him, just in case.

They walk through a space once occupied by a door and find a large, wide hallway that seems even darker than the lobby they were just in. The light Keith holds shines a line only a few steps ahead of them; he turns to look up at the ceiling when Keith directs his camera there just to catch everything. It feels like stepping right into a wolf's mouth. The only sounds Shiro can hear are their footsteps tapping on the floor covered almost entirely with rotten leaves and mud, Keith's breathing, and of course, the pounding in his ears getting louder as the knot in his stomach grows tighter. Because inside this hallway, the sound of cars driving down the road can only be heard like a faint whisper, like a gust of wind rustling dry leaves. 

Keith isn't saying anything. Shiro thinks that if Keith has any intention of posting this video anywhere, he better find some amazing background music to play over the footage because otherwise this will be the most boring video the internet has ever seen. Unless they do run into some ritual murderers. But he's not gonna think about that. 

"Wanna go left or right?" Keith asks with a cheerful tone that is so oddly out of place in this situation it makes Shiro wish he had listened to Hunk. It makes him wish he had stayed with Hunk. 

God, he misses Hunk.

"Let's go left, I guess," Shiro says, giving Keith's bony shoulder a little squeeze.

"Left it is!"

After taking a few steps, the darkness around Shiro seems so tangible he can almost feel it seeping into his lungs. The air feels heavier and wetter, almost sickly, and when Keith shines a light on a door and opens it without even asking if he should, the smell coming from inside that room almost makes Shiro retch. And Keith, too. It's like being hit in the face with the smell of half a ton of putrid eggs mixed with shit and piss accumulated for years plus something else Shiro can't even try to decipher out of fear that if he thinks too much about it, he will never stop vomiting.

"What the fuck is that smell?" Shiro groans once they've both taken a bunch of steps back.

"It's like someone fucking died in there," Keith remarks, holding his free hand to his mouth. 

His wide eyes meet Shiro's as soon as the words leave his mouth. They both know what the other is thinking. And Shiro, especially, knows what Keith is about to do, and doesn't even try to stop him.

Quickly, Keith covers his nose and mouth with the neck of his shirt and heads back towards the door, shining the light directly into the room; Shiro follows closely behind, because he won't let Keith get traumatized on his own. It's romance or love or something. What they find in there is a deep hole that Keith almost falls into, were it not for Shiro putting his arm around his waist and pulling him back at the right second. Cursing, Keith manages to thank Shiro and then shines the light into the pit: there's about three broken toilet seats dumped into it, mud and dirt and the constant, nauseating buzzing of flies, but thankfully, no actual body to be found. There's shards of broken porcelain and glass sticking out from that pile of filth that surely would have maimed Keith if he had fallen. The thought of it makes Shiro anxious, to the point that he feels nauseated again. 

"Okay, come here, enough of that," Shiro urges and pulls Keith back.

Naively, Shiro thinks for just one second that this will make Keith turn around and leave the building, but of course Keith only takes a deep breath and points the camera lens at himself, and then at Shiro. 

"Let's keep going," Keith smiles.

"I guess..."

Shiro swears that as they walk to the right and around a corner he can hear footsteps behind them, to which Keith seems blissfully oblivious. There's a gross, squelching sound that is just close enough to be heard but distant enough to be unsettling; Shiro keeps looking over his shoulder as Keith guides him, and he keeps trying to calm himself down before he starts imagining things. Like whispers. 

"Do you wanna go upstairs and see what we find?" Keith asks with the camera once again pointed right at Shiro's face. Shiro wonders how unflattering all these close-ups will look once they go over the video. Assuming nothing strange happens. 

Shiro looks at the staircase. If anything happens it probably won't be the stairs collapsing under their weight since they're made of solid concrete, and that's comforting as well as alarming since--well, if something happens it won't be that mundane. "Sure, why not."

The sound of Keith's footsteps is all he can hear for a few seconds. Up here, there is some light coming in through the broken windows, yellow rays from the lamp posts outside that make everything look sickly: the graffiti on the walls he can't decipher, the mud and garbage piled up on every corner, the pitiful planks of wood nailed over empty spaces some doors should be. 

"There's nothing much up here, I guess," Keith says, clearly disappointed--Shiro still doesn't know exactly what he was expecting to find, but the sound of his voice almost makes him feel relief, thinking they'll finally leave and go back to Hunk. "Oh, geez," Keith exclaims and suddenly stops.

"What?" Shiro practically cries out, officially obliterating every last notion that he was keeping it together.

"Nothing, Kashi, I just almost stepped on a dead rat," Keith explains and turns to look at Shiro. He presses a hand to his chest and laughs. "Geez, babe, you sure you're okay? Your heart's racing."

"I'm totally fine."

"Then let's go in here," Keith points at a room. 

"Or we could leave."

"Oh, come on babe, what are you scared is going to hap--"

A loud banging noise interrupts him--and then another, and another, each of them increasingly louder and coming from the ground floor. The first thing Shiro imagines is that something heavy fell over. A bookshelf, maybe. But then the second banging noise, then the third one, immediately makes him think of someone hitting the floor or the wall with a baseball bat. 

Shiro's mouth is dry and if his heart had been racing before he's pretty sure it's about to burst out of his chest. It doesn't help that Keith instinctively pushes himself against Shiro's side and is gripping the loose fabric of his empty sleeve. They hear footsteps then, echoing from somewhere unknown, and Shiro knows this isn't in his head because Keith looks at him with wide eyes.

"Let's head this way," Keith says, still tugging a little on Shiro's sleeve and walking in the opposite direction of the noises but further into the darkness of the building, tinted with sickly yellow light.

"We finally leaving?" 

"Probably not," Keith confesses and continues to record some more strange markings on one remaining door: senseless scratches and yet another pentagram carved into the wood. 

“Probably not? _Probably?_ Probably _not?_ ” Shiro can’t help his voice rising a little bit, he’s just that damn anxious. 

“I mean, there’s probably a fire exit somewhere but I don’t really know where it is--”

A loud, deep moan startles them both again, and this time it’s Shiro who grabs Keith’s sleeve, accidentally pinching his arm and making him yelp. In only a matter of seconds that feel like hours to Shiro, the moan becomes an even louder grunt, deep and bone-chilling and definitely, definitely coming from the ground floor. The distinctive sound of glass being broken almost makes him scream. He can hear Keith whispering “Fuck” under his breath and it feels like time stretches and stops as the grunts turn into curses and become louder--closer. “Fuck, fuck, _fuck,_ ” Keith exclaims and grabs Shiro’s hand, effectively pulls him along as they run down the hallway and end up backed against a wall in a room that smells like death. 

“Fuck me!” Keith cries out, and when Shiro asks what’s wrong, he grunts out that he dropped the flashlight somewhere while they were running. 

But Shiro has switched into survival-mode. He’s sure there’s someone else in the building, he’s almost sure this person is carrying some kind of heavy weapon; he doesn’t want to be beaten to death today, and he knows he fully charged his phone for a reason. So, what he does, almost impossibly fast, is pull out his phone and turn on the flashlight--nowhere nearly as powerful as the real thing Keith brought along, but it will do. Shiro shines the light around the room to try and find a window, a hole in the wall, a miraculous second door; he doesn’t stop to notice the stupid, edgy graffiti or the dark-red color of the walls. His lungs are filled with a putrid smell and he can only hear a bizarre combination of his heart pounding and footsteps getting closer. 

“There, look, there,” he urges, pointing his flashlight at a window that is entirely covered up with planks of wood, but is the only way out. Keith runs towards it and drops the camera, starts to pull at the wood while Shiro does the best he can to help. The footsteps are getting closer, and Shiro’s heart is beating so fast it feels like it will blow up inside his ribcage--Keith grunts and pulls at the wood to no avail. There’s nothing to break it with, nothing to loosen up the nails with; Shiro’s mind is going a thousand miles an hour and his eyes are darting across the room: is there somewhere to hide? Heavy thuds are now practically right outside the door, whoever is out there is so close there’s the unmistakable sound of deep pants along with the steps, and Shiro swears he can see his life flash before his eyes. Keith grunts and curses one last time, and hell, at least Shiro will have died next to someone he loves. 

“Guys?”

Keith stops his frantic pulling of the wood and stares at Shiro, wide-eyed, so terrified it seems that there’s tears in the corners of his eyes. Shiro’s staring back at him, just as wide-eyed. Instead of desperation, what he can feel in the air is disbelief. 

“Guys? Guys, please tell me it’s you in there.”

Shiro can’t get his throat to make a sound. By the looks of it, neither can Keith. 

“Please, guys, come on. Tell me it’s you and not some crazy killer hiding in the shadows…” The voice is close. There’s a flash of light coming from a cell phone. And then Hunk sighs in relief. “Oh, oh, my gosh. Thank god it’s you, guys, wow.”

“Hunk,” Keith deadpans. 

Shiro just blinks. 

“Hunk. Babe. What are you doing here?” Keith asks, his chest heaving and his hand still gripping the edge of a plank of wood so tightly his knuckles look white under Shiro’s phone light. 

“You guys were taking _forever_ to come back, I was scared something might’ve happened to you two.”

“You just scared us half to death, is all,” Shiro says, his voice a lot shakier than he’s okay with. 

“I’m sorry, you guys. Can we leave now?”

“Was that just you out there?” Keith’s voice is even and calm now, and he grabs Shiro’s phone and walks towards the door. 

“Uh, yeah? Man, it’s real fucking creepy in here,” Hunk says, stepping closer to Shiro, who is still somewhat frozen on the spot. “Gosh, you guys look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

Shiro kind of deflates a little at the comment, while Keith audibly grunts and leaves the room. 

“Listen, guys, why don’t we just go get our tacos, go back home, watch a silly movie before bed, you know, lift our spirits a little bit. Huh? How about that?” Hunk wraps an arm around Shiro’s waist and pulls him very gently towards the door--but not before picking up the camera off the floor, of course. He turns it around in his hands and realizes the thing is still recording, and, well, he wouldn’t be Hunk if he just turned it off. 

He points it right at himself and gives a goofy, yet absolutely fucking dashing smile. He winks and half-turns his face and holds his chin with two fingers like a very thoughtful model or something, and at least that makes Shiro finally relax. 

“I guess we did get all we could out of this place, right,” Shiro says, smiling and giving Hunk a quick peck on the lips because he keeps turning his face and modeling for the camera and it’s just impossible to resist him. 

But there’s no answer. So Hunk points the camera and its weaker light towards the door as they make their way out there. 

“Keith?” Shiro calls out. “Keith? Come on, we’re leaving.”

“Show yourself, buddy, those tacos aren’t gonna wait forever,” Hunk follows, desperately trying to lighten the mood because Keith is nowhere to be found. 

They both walk for about ten steps heading towards the staircase, Shiro shining his phone light around the hallway and into the rooms that are accessible, and Hunk almost absentmindedly recording everything and doing a much, much better job at narrating the adventure than Keith did: “Okay, so here we have what appears to be really fucking creepy carvings on the wood, in my scientific opinion. It smells like a litter box that hasn’t been cleaned in six years in here, by the way. And I’m pretty sure--yep, yep, just stepped on what I’m really hoping is mud. Here’s a closeup of the carvings. What do you guys think, demon doodles or edgy teenagers with box cutters?”

A loud bang followed by a shrill, blood-curdling scream echoes through the entire building, and Hunk immediately turns with the camera in hand to record the place it seems to come from. He grabs Shiro’s arm and half-hides behind him, breathing loud and fast and still bravely recording. “Keith? Buddy, that’s fucked up. Get back here.”

There’s another scream. 

“Keith?” Shiro calls out. 

“Okay, Keith--” Hunk starts, but is interrupted by what sounds like a piercing cackle. 

Frozen in place as he is, Shiro can feel a cold breeze up his back, making every hair on his body stand, and he distinctly hears the sound of an angry voice whispering _“Leave!”_

“Jesus, Mary, Joseph and the donkey--Shiro, Shiro, come on, we gotta go, babe, come on,” he rushes, tugging at Shiro’s sleeve to make him follow in his hurried footsteps towards the staircase. 

They’re running down the rest of the hallway towards the staircase, and they’re only guided by the inadequate light of the camera and Shiro’s cellphone, and they stumble down at times but manage to make it to the large lobby. 

“Keith? Keith!” Hunk calls out again while Shiro tries to shine some light somewhere, unable to reach all the dark corners, all the spaces behind the thick columns or behind broken and tipped-over furniture. “Keith, I swear to god, this isn’t funny! We’re leaving!”

“Geez! I’m right here, can you stop yelling?” Keith grumbles in that unique way he has, suddenly appearing from behind one of the torn-up armchairs. 

“We’re leaving, come on,” Hunk urges again, not even bothering to give him a stern look or ask him what the fuck was he doing. 

“Hang on,” Keith says, to which Shiro immediately replies with: “No, now.”

“I just found this little fellow here,” Keith explains with a look on his face so similar to a pout it makes both Hunk and Shiro stop right in their tracks. 

Keith very gently cradles a large cat in his arms. The thing is gigantic. It looks to Shiro like a multi-colored mop and it isn’t until the cat meows that he truly believes what he’s seeing. 

Hunk, of course, is already melting. 

“Ohhh, hey, buddy,” he coos, stepping closer to Keith instantly and scratching the fluffy thing behind its ears. “Hey, little guy, whatcha doin here, huh? Why you here in such a creepy, stinky place, huh?” he continues to scratch the cat’s head and makes it purr so loud it sounds like an engine inside the abandoned lobby. “Are you lost, little one? Are you hurt? Keith--guys, guys we gotta take it to the vet.”

Shiro’s melting now, too. He’s been through so many emotions in the span of a few hours that he’s pretty sure the second his head hits the pillow he’s gonna sleep through the following week, but he can’t stop smiling, looking at Hunk stroke and pet the cat while Keith holds it so tenderly. They’re both so sweet and so damn dumb, it’s like his heart is swelling with love but his knees are giving out because of anxiety. 

“Okay, how about we take him home now,” Shiro says, and they both agree.

Hunk being himself, he continues to scratch the cat’s head and record everything, walking next to Keith as Shiro follows close behind them. They walk back out into the yard and the cool night air that makes him realize just how humid and disgusting the air was inside the building--but hey, he’s never, ever, going back in there, so why does he care. The three of them walk across the grass and garbage and dry patches towards the broken fence, and they struggle, but they manage to slide back out into the street through the hole. Hunk looks into the camera, smiling another of his dashing smiles and saying goodbye to his imaginary audience. 

“Well, that’s it for tonight, fellas. Don’t tune in next week since this is never happening again. Don’t drink and drive. Don’t do drugs. Always use a condom--”

“ _Hunk_ ,” Shiro says, but god, he’s so relaxed now he can’t stop himself from smiling, even when Hunk points the camera straight at him. 

“Especially when you’re having a two-for-one meal for dinner, am I right, guys?” Hunk says, panning the camera over Shiro’s body and then pointing it at Keith, starting with his legs and moving up his torso until he’s met with his extremely grumpy face. Hunk chuckles, then points the camera back at himself and winks, before finally turning it off.

In the car, Keith decides to sit in the back to take care of the fuzzy giant who does not stop meowing and does not stop purring; they decide the food truck will wait for another day and that they can order some takeout once they’re back home. 

“So that was this little guy making all that noise, huh?” Hunk asks as he drives back home, stretching his arm back to pat the cat’s ear before putting both hands on the wheel again. 

“Yep. He climbed on an old bookshelf and it fell over and scared him so he yelled, I guess. I just started laughing when I saw him,” Keith says, stroking the cat as it sits on his lap and kneads and nuzzles his hoodie. 

“I’m glad it was just him,” Hunk says, and continues to drive. 

Shiro looks out the window. He hears Keith telling Hunk about the pentagrams and the weird, viscous thing they found, about the broken toilets in that hole and the rest of the things he saw. When Hunk asks if Keith will show the video to anyone, Keith just shrugs and answers “Maybe.”

The town’s almost completely empty at this time, only one or two cars driving around as they take the last turn right towards their apartment building. The Chinese restaurant a few blocks away is open 24 hours on the weekends so Shiro’s not worried about cooking or anything of the sort, and he feels like every last trace of stress and anxiety has finally left his body as Hunk parks the car. But oh, then he remembers. And, as a reflex, he smacks his hand right down on Hunk’s arm and grips it, feeling almost drenched in a sudden, cold sweat. 

“Who the fuck told us to leave? Hunk? You heard it too, didn’t you?”

He just sees Hunk’s eyes grow five times their size and all the color drained from his face in a second.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! i hope it was at least fun since i had a blast writing it. find me on twittererer @gothshirogane and talk to me about the beautiful boys


End file.
